


plastic jesus

by kpkndy



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Fluff, Kissing, M/M, Soldier Enhancement Program Era, Swearing, a lovers tiff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-03
Updated: 2017-05-03
Packaged: 2018-10-27 20:21:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10816020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kpkndy/pseuds/kpkndy
Summary: gabriel and jack argue over the semantics of hotdogs.





	plastic jesus

**Author's Note:**

> a very real topic of conversation that has gotten me into shouting matches more than once: 
> 
> is a hotdog a sandwich?

“Oh my --you can’t be serious.”   
  
Jack is hurrying behind him, shifting to pass people in the corridor, staying right on his ass and talking nonsense.   
  
“I’m being totally serious.” He says, like Gabe is the one being ridiculous here. “I mean, fundamentally speaking, it’s bread and filling. That’s --that’s a sandwich, right?”   
  
He thinks that he’s finally gone stir crazy. That, after all the time he’s spent cooped up under the flourescent lights, having seen all the things he’s seen, he’s finally cracked. There’s no other reason he’s be so willfully engaged in something so banal --and the thing is, gabe knows it’s pointless. But he also knows Jack is wrong.   
  
“Sandwiches are bread, you idiot.” He says, passing through the cafeteria threshold and looking over his shoulder. He gets a delight to see Jack stride behind him with a distracted sort of confidence, stopping at Gabe’s back as they join the lunch line. “Hot dogs are like --buns or something, right? You don’t use a bun to make a sandwich.”   
  
“I mean, you could.” Jack takes a tray from the dispenser and looks past the broad shoulders of other men to get a look at what they’re serving. “I wouldn’t mind a hot dog right now. Even if it was made with two slices of bread.”   
  
Gabe barks out a short laugh, and shakes his head. “Well, then it would be a sandwich, you moron. It’d just be a --a--”   
  
“A hot dog. Right.”   
  
“ _Wrong_ .” If Gabe wasn’t using both his hands, he’d smack the kid on the back of the head. But his hands are occupied, and it’s a good thing, too, because Gabe doesn’t even know his own strength thesedays anyway. Jack could probably take it, to be fair. His shoulders have probably doubled in width over the last month. “Look, you can’t just --you can’t just stick things into other things and call it a sandwich.”   
  
“Nobody’s talking about that.” Jack shakes his head, sounding so resolute. “I’m not talking about anarchy, for God’s sake. I mean, a bun is still bread.” They move up in the line, and Gabe thinks that no matter what they get served, if there’s anything with gluten nearby, Jack will probably call it a damn sandwich. “It’s all bread, you know?”   
  
“But that doesn’t make it --there’s more to it than that.” Gabe sighs. He’s probably taking this a bit to heart. “I mean --shit, a calzone isn’t a sandwich, is it?” They move another step up, and he looks back at Jack, half-witheringly.   
  
“It’s something in bread. What are you, a --a _bread expert_ ?”   
  
“I’m not a fucking idiot’s what I am. Bread’s not even in the right direction in a damn hot dog.” He’s being served, suddenly, and moves along to get his tray filled with something distinctly less appetising than a hot dog. It’s probably got some kind of reconstituted meat in it, but then, just like a hot dog, he thinks it’s mostly sawdust.   
  
“Direction?” Jack is confused, to say the least.   
  
“Yeah.” Leading them, Gabe finds a few seats on the end of one bench and sets down. “Like, the bread goes on the top and bottom. That’s, like --a fundamental of sandwiches, right?” He takes a mouthful of food, then, just to put an end to it, but Jack is never one to be beaten so easily.   
  
“Well,” Jack says, initially at a loss, until he finds a new straw to clutch at. “What if you turn it sideways?” He smiles after he says it like it’s some genius thought. It’s embarrassing   
  
“You ever see somebody eat a hot dog sideways?” Gabe stares at him, blandly, and when Jack doesn’t have anything to say immediately, he laughs. “Exactly. It doesn’t make any fucking sense --just like your argument.”   
  
Jack looks down at his food for a second, frowning, looking more confused than hurt, and then he looks up, frowning, pushing part of his food around instead of eating it. “Well, if it’s not a sandwich, then what is it?”   
  
Gabe drops his fork, and looks up, boredly. “Seriously?”   
  
Throwing up a hand, Jack shrugs. “I’m just saying --you’re so sure it’s not a sandwich, then what actually is it?”   
  
A couple of the other men to their left are looking over, and Gabe thinks he’ll have to pick between the knife or the fork to kill himself with if this becomes a debate. He looks up at Jack and shakes his head again. “It’s a hot dog, genius.”   
  
Jack’s not buying it. He points a finger, and his tone is nothing but solemn when he asks again. “Yes, I know that, but what I mean is,” He speaks, again, “If you were to like, buy it, in a store, what section would it be under?”   
  
For that, Gabe does lean over and smack him on the back of the head. “Who ever bought a hotdog at a fucking store?!” He despairs, bitingly. “You’re grasping at straws, gringo. Even if you could get one in a store, it’d probably be under, like --shit, ‘food to go’ or something.”   
  
“Yeah.” Jack says. One of his hands is nursing the back of his head a little, and Gabe takes another mouthful to avoid the flare of guilt that takes him. “With the sandwiches.”   
  
“Oh, Jesus.” He lets out another hard sigh. “You know, if it’s like anything, it’s more like a taco.”   
  
Jack laughs at that. “What--”   
  
“Hey --hey, listen, alright?” Gabe holds up a hold to silence the kid. “The food goes in the middle, and it’s -- _look_ .” He uses his free hand to curve in the same way he’d hold one, gesturing to where his palm is. “They’re both one-handed foods, you know?”   
  
Jack lifts his fork, but pauses again, dropping it. “Are you saying you can’t eat a sandwich with one hand?” This time, when Gabe leans over to smack him, he leans away, yelling, “ _Hey!_ ”   
  
“You eat a sandwich with one hand, it’s called a mess.” Admonishingly, Gabe shakes his head. “It doesn’t work. But you can eat a hotdog with one hand.” He tils his head like he’s already won. “You get it? They’re different.”   
  
His condescension is, as always, very appreciated. “I get it.” Jack says, a little sourly. “I mean, I never said they were exactly the same. I’m just saying, gun to your head, is a hot dog a sandwich? Yes.”   
  
Gabe thinks that he’ll kill Jack first, at this rate. “No.” He says, resolutely. “It’s not a fucking sandwich. That’s like --like, cats and dogs aren’t the same, but gun to your head, is a cat a dog? No. it’s still a cat, you moron.” He picks up his knife to cut into something, but gestures with it as he talks. “I mean, sure, they both got four legs, but that don’t make them the same.”   
  
It’s probably the most conversation the cafeteria has ever seen. God knows Gabe doesn’t have much to say about anything in these days, but Jack is easy to talk to, and he’s wrong about so much that if Gabe doesn’t correct him, who will?   
  
“Surely.” Jack starts up, the moment they get any semblance of peace. “Surely there’s like a gradient --of sandwiches, I mean.” He leaves the words there like it’s supposed to make sense, but all it does it make Gabe want to hit him again.   
  
“Do you even hear yourself? Fucking --’sandwich gradient’.” Gabe realises he’s yelling, suddenly, and has to stop himself. “It is or it isn’t. Ain’t no fucking spectrum.”   
  
Jack holds up both of his palms, then, like he’s trying to calm the other man down. “I’m just saying, if it _walks_ like a duck, and _quacks_ like a duck--”   
  
Almost automatically, he hears himself mutter, “I’ll make you quack like a goddamn duck.” Gabe loads his fork with more food and prays that the distraction will work. The kid’s got no business being so damn lighthearted, and leather-headed, all at once. “Just shut up and eat.”   
  
He thinks it’s worked, too, and he sees Jack smirking a little behind his own fork. “So you give in, then.” The kid smiles out of the corner of his mouth like he can’t quite believe it. “You admit I’m right--”   
  
Gabe has all but stopped caring until Jack says that, and then he’s practically out of his seat, hissing. “Nobody’s admitting _any_ thing.” He says, tiredly. “Just --just eat your lunch before I do.”   
  
Maybe it’s not admitting defeat, but the kid clearly knows it’s as close to a concession as he’s going to get, so he takes a bite of something and sits there, looking vaguely pleased with himself. It’s the same face he always pulls when he knows he’s gotten under Gabe’s skin, and Gabe sort of wishes he could smack it off of Jack’s face with the same ferocity that he thinks he kind of likes it.   
  
For now, he lets it be, and they finish eating in silence. Jack leads, this time, getting up first, and waiting for Gabe without ever really saying anything, only stepping to head out once they’re both standing.   
  
It’s in the corridor, outside of their room, that the kid turns to him with a finger raised and a face that’s looking for trouble. “Okay, but you can eat some sandwiches with one--”   
  
Gabe grabs him by the front of the shirt, yanking him in, and then kissing him. It’s rough as hell, and afterwards, he gives the back of Jack’s thick skull another wack, just for good measure.   
  
“You’re lucky I like you.” He says, gruffly, and heads into the room. He doesn’t have to look behind him to know the dazed, slack-jawed wonderment Jack is modelling, still out in the hall.   
  
“Yeah.” The kid says, airily, and he comes inside. “Lucky.”

**Author's Note:**

> fun trivia: i wrote this directly after 'hope dies last' in an effort to prove i'm not always angsty. 
> 
> like it? [request something! ](https://kiipkennedy.tumblr.com/commissions)


End file.
